The Pulse：The spike in student suicide & interview with democracy expert, Larry Diamond

The coming Sunday has been designated by the United Nations as the International Day of Happiness. This week, the UN revealed that Hong Kong is slipping down the happiness charts in the annual World Happiness Report. 156 countries and territories were surveyed. Hong Kong slipped to 75th place. It was 42nd in 2012.
There are pressures on everyone, but particularly – it seems – on children. The spike in student suicides since this academic year started last September has many parents extremely worried.
Stanford University Professor Larry Diamond has spent decades researching democratic development around the world. He’s been seeing signs of a global recession of democracy over the past ten years, and that’s not just about the political ascent of Donald Trump. Contributing factors include the erosion of rule of law, the dominance of autocrats, corruption, and declining democratic effectiveness and strategies. However he believes though that democrats should not lose faith, as: “Democracy may be receding somewhat in practice, but it is still globally ascendant in peoples’ values and aspirations.” Professor Diamond was visiting Hong Kong this week. We went to talk to him.